Chiropractic for Children UGH

[scottder]

Well I am new here so I can't post a full URL, remove the +'s below. Was from a free magazine for parents.

h++p://ik3a.com/chiro.png

Amazes me what they can say in these days.

Scott

PS - On the upside I am glad we've found a local Montsorri school that focuses on Science and critical thinking. So rare.

 

[Blue Wode]

Well I am new here so I can't post a full URL, remove the +'s below. Was from a free magazine for parents.

h++p://ik3a.com/chiro.png

Amazes me what they can say in these days.

Scott

Hello Scott, and welcome to the forum. Here’s your link:
http://ik3a.com/chiro.png

Yes, it is amazing what chiropractors get away with. It should really be the job of the chiropractic regulators to define and limit their scope of practice, but, at present, regulation doesn’t question the validity of chiropractic treatment approaches (here in the UK anyway).

You might like to take a look at a current thread over at the General Skepticism and The Paranormal forum. It addresses many of chiropractic’s problems:
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63056

Regards chiropractic for children, there is barely any evidence to justify it. Here’s what UK Skeptics have to say about it:

 Targeting children.

As with many alternative practitioners, chiropractors are looking to increase their presence in an expanding, lucrative market. One target market seems to be children who, apparently, cannot be too young to have their spines examined and manipulated.

Chiropractors have claimed that conditions that may respond to chiropractic care in babies and young children include: asthma; ear infections; Attention Deficit Disorder; learning disorders; respiratory problems; clumsiness; bed-wetting; stomach problems; hyperactivity; colic; and immune system problems.

Chiropractic has been described as "a treatment in search of a disease". An illustration of this effect was shown when Stephen Barrett, M.D took a perfectly healthy young girl to five different chiropractors, and each one gave a misdiagnosis based on finding subluxations (see: chirobase article. Opens in a new window).This form of subjective diagnosis is common in alternative therapies. Each practitioner coming up with a different diagnosis and treatment to all others practising in exactly the same field.

A claim chiropractors make is that by treating babies and children, they are preventing disease from developing. Proving this type of negative is not possible, and the claim is an emotional appeal to fear.

Paediatricians are qualified doctors who specialise in the treatment of children and many are opposed to so-called Paediatric Chiropractors' claims to be able to cure or prevent childhood illnesses with spinal manipulations.

http://www.skeptics.org.uk/article.php?dir=articles&article=chiropractic.php

And now here’s some promotional literature from the website of the British Chiropractic Association:

A healthy future
As your children grow, you will be getting their eyes and teeth checked regularly. Consider giving them regular chiropractic checkups too, which could give them the best start in life with a healthy spine and nervous system.

Can a chiropractor treat a newborn baby?
Yes, in fact the sooner your baby is checked, the sooner any injury of stresses from the birth can be dealt with safely and gently.

Don’t children just grow out of it?
Not necessarily. Problems with their spines and nervous systems might not show obvious symptoms for years. Colic, ear infections, learning difficulties or frequent illness may be signs that your children’s nervous system is not working efficiently.

http://www.chiropractic-uk.co.uk/gfx/uploads/textbox/Happy families.pdf

And here’s a statement issued by The chiefs of the Departments of Pediatrics, and pediatric hospitals in Canada back in 1994:

1. Chiropractic spinal manipulation is NOT required as a preventive therapy to maintain a child's health.
2. Chiropractic spinal manipulation is NOT an alternative for pediatric immunization. Books sold at the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College in Toronto are anti-immunization in nature.
3. Chiropractic does NOT alter the course of, nor does it prevent in any way, childhood illness such as ear infections, asthma attacks, bed-wetting, or infantile colic.
4. Chiropractic use of x-rays of infants and children to diagnose so-called vertebral subluxations is unscientific and of no value whatsoever. These x-rays can contribute, without any benefit to the child, to the future risk in the child of cancers and genetic damage. Parents should never allow their children's spines to be x-rayed by a chiropractor.
5. There is no scientific evidence whatsoever that the so-called chiropractic spinal adjustment results in any correction to a child's spine. These adjustments are ineffective and useless.

Read on…
http://www.ndir.com/chiro/chiefs.html

More here:
Chiropractic care for children: Controversies and issues
http://www.cps.ca/english/statements/CP/cp02-01.htm

Of course, spinal manipulative therapy may be beneficial for a small number of children with musculoskeletal pain, but as for the rest of the claims made for 'chiropractic paediatrics', they don’t seem to be based on any reliable scientific evidence.

 

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

How's this for 'cutting edge' chiropractic practice?

http://www.vitalbodyclinic.co.uk/anaphylaxia_results.html

 

[scottder]

Blue,

Thanks for the links and posting the link. I hadn't seen an ad like this one in a while (to be honest, I hadn't been looking, but I am sure they existed). I guess what suprised me was the focus on children. I thought chiropractors had since stopped making claims like this one, but I guess I am sadly mistaken. I may just research further now.

Badly Shaved Monkey,

Ugh, trully sad.